Johnson County Community College
Press Release
College Information and Publications
913-469-8500
Julie Haas, Director, ext. 3120
Peggy Graham, Writer, ext. 3425
Tyler Cundith, Sports Information Director, ext. 3122
8/16/06
Story by Peggy Graham
JCCC Test Drives Mobile Dental Clinic
OVERLAND PARK, Kan. – Johnson County Community College has received a $250,000 grant from the REACH Healthcare Foundation to help purchase a mobile dental unit, which was demonstrated Wednesday by LifeLine Mobile, Carlsbad, Calif., on the JCCC campus.
mobile_dental.jpg: This content expired on 08/16/2008 at 03:05PM.
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Heather Flick, JCCC dental hygiene professor, and principal coordinator for the grant, stands in front of the LifeLine Mobile Med demo unit on Wednesday, Aug. 16 at JCCC. |
The mobile unit would allow supervised JCCC dental hygiene students to provide care to underserved populations. Services would include screenings and routine preventive care such as cleanings, fluoride treatments, x-rays, referrals, sealants and nutritional guidance.
The mobile facility addresses the transportation problem that underserved clients face when trying to obtain health and dental care. The grant is the largest ever awarded by REACH, created in 2003 from the proceeds of Health Midwest’s $1.13 billion sale to HCA, whose mission is to provide equal access to healthcare in the metropolitan area.
Likewise, the target population for the JCCC mobile unit, dubbed “Oral Health on Wheels,” is the underinsured and uninsured children, children with handicaps and
geriatric populations in the metropolitan area and surrounding counties including Johnson, Wyandotte and Allen counties in Kansas and Jackson, Clay and Platte counties in Missouri. Also targeted will be elementary and middle schools where greater than 50 percent of the children receive subsidized meals.
JCCC has committed $36,000 annually to maintain the vehicle, but the college is still in need of $300,000 in donations to match the REACH Foundation grant and provide supplies for the first two years of operation.
JCCC dental students have participated in multiple free clinics to help people in need – as part of a $40,000 Greater Health Foundation grant to assist lower-income Hispanic families at JCCC in 2006, the Kansas Mission of Mercy at the Kansas Speedway in 2003, and the service-learning project to Las Pintas in Mexico summers since 1998.
For more information about Oral Health on Wheels and donations to the project, contact the JCCC Foundation at 913-469-3835.
